The Ugliest Christmas Sweater

When I sit down with pen in hand

to write Santa Claus my annual letter,

the only thing I will ask him for

is the world's ugliest Christmas sweater,

one that depicts Cthulhu

driving a big red sleigh

and a hippopotamus in a tutu

performing the Nutcracker ballet,

a sweater sprinkled with snowflakes

of many sizes and shapes

and Santa in a spaceship bringing presents

to the Planet of the Apes

and a unicorn and llama

running though the snow,

while Godzilla and King Kong

play hockey on a giant ice floe

while standing by in a Santa suit

would be Edgar Allan Poe,

and a Yeti wearing an ugly Christmas sweater,

so I would have an ugly Christmas sweater

within an ugly Christmas sweater.

Could there possibly be anything better?

Maybe a Yeti wearing an ugly Christmas sweater

depicting a Yeti wearing an ugly Christmas sweater

depicting a Yeti wearing an ugly Christmas sweater

depicting a Yeti wearing an ugly Christmas sweater

ad infinitum.

That's the only item

I'll ask Santa for

when I write him! - Jeff Barnes

Happiness

Sometimes it's enough

to sit and drink coffee

and observe

the leafless dance of branches

in the gray morning breeze

through the glass door

of a November kitchen. - Jeff Barnes

The Treachery of Words

If we have Christmas in July

why can't we have Independence Day in December?

What is the use of sleeping on memory foam

if it never helps us to remember?

An angel fish doesn't have a halo,

nor does it play a harp.

Its main boasting point seems to be

that it's much prettier than a carp.

You may like antipasta 

but that doesn't mean you're against spaghetti.

A Himalayan snowman isn't really abominable,

so please, just call him a Yeti.

Why are gooseberries not made of geese?

Why is breadfruit not made out of bread?

We know that water never sleeps

so what's the use of having a riverbed?

Why do they call French toast French

when it did not originate in France?

Why don't they call it a fowl ball

when chickens go to a formal dance?

Why is there always a traffic jam

but never traffic jelly?

Why can't we buy Indian food

over at the new deli?

Why can we call someone the apple of our eye

but never a grape or pomegranate?
How would we explain our screwed-up language

to someone from another planet?

Why can there be a fork in the road

but never a spoon or a knife?

Maybe I should stop this train of thought

and work on getting a life. - Jeff Barnes

Haiku

Deep in September

under the night clouds, crickets

sing summer to sleep. - Jeff Barnes

Picnic

Blue fauns, green mastodons, and pink-speckled swans

cavorted on the ground.

We carefully avoided the eyeball daisies

as we spread our blankets down.

A woman stood at an ironing board

on the neon purple grass.

We offered her a sandwich,

but she said she'd have to pass.

Then she rode her board like a surfer

and bade us all goodbye.

She said she had laundry to deliver

as she zoomed off into the sky.

Some fish at at the bottom of a pond

were enjoying their afternoon tea.

We got a craving for ice cream cones,

so we picked some from a nearby tree.

As the day morphed into evening

the daisies all closed their eyes.

The sun gave us a wink and wave

and said he had somewhere else to rise.

We lay back on our blankets

after he vanished from sight

and gazed at the backbone of the universe,

the skeleton of night. - Jeff Barnes

Haiku

Cat sits regally

like a statue of Bastet

in the litter box. - Jeff Barnes

Gardener

She realized

as she uprooted

his neglected flower bed's

overgrown weeds

that he gardened

like he fathered,

disappearing shortly after

he had sown his seeds. - Jeff Barnes